Former Bush, Reid aides approved for broadcasting board

Update, 9:50 p.m.: The Senate confirmed the appointment of all eight Broadcasting Board of Governors nominees by a unanimous voice vote Wednesday night.

Original post: Ending one of the longest standoffs in recent nomination history, Senate Democrats reached accommodation with Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) to allow the confirmation of a high-profile collection of nominees to the Broadcasting Board of Governors.

The deal should allow for the Senate to clear all eight nominations to the bipartisan board overseeing the government's overseas news agencies such as Voice of America and Radio TV/Marti. Those include former Time magazine editor Walter Isaacson, former Bush White House press secretary Dana Perino, and Susan McCue, the former chief of staff to Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.).

The BBG's board has not been fully formed since December 2004. McCue, who is a Democratic consultant now, has been languishing as a nominee since fall 2007. Another nominee, former Senate Democratic aide Michael Meehan, was first nominated by the Bush administration two years ago and cleared the Foreign Relations Committee in summer 2008, but then had his nomination stalled. Last November, Obama renominated McCue and Meehan, along with six others who would provide the BBG its first full slate of members since the end of the first term of George W. Bush -- before Perino was even press secretary.

Coburn has argued that the BBG is a waste of taxpayers' money, with a budget of about $750 million overseeing entities such as Radio Free Europe -- which was created during the Cold War and meant to undermine the now-nonexistent Soviet Union. "The BBG is the most worthless organization in the federal government," Coburn told Foreign Policy last month. "It's full of people who know nothing about media or foreign policy. All they are doing is spending money, and somebody's got to look into it."

On Tuesday, Coburn and Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), the committee chairman, came to an agreement that will mean more oversight for the BBG. If Coburn allowed all eight BBG nominees to pass by a unanimous voice vote, Kerry promised to invite Coburn, who is not a member of the panel, to serve as a "guest of the committee" at an oversight hearing on the board, giving the Oklahoma Republican a temporary perch to rail against the BBG's expenditures of taxpayer dollars.

"We appreciate your attention to international broadcasting and we look forward to working with you," Kerry wrote.

Coburn's office confirmed that he has lifted his hold on the nominees, meaning that if no other senator objects, the nominees should be confirmed very soon, possibly as early as Wednesday night.

Coburn is correct. This propaganda ministry has no place in a free and democratic society that should lead by example, not by psy ops and ham-fisted jingoism.

Dana Perino didn't even know what the Cuban Missile Crisis was. Perhaps this ministry should educate its own apparachiks first.

And why the over-arching title of "Broadcasting Board of Governors," a title that imputes no limits to its mission? The Pentagon already has these bases covered, by way of black bugets benefitting "information systems" defense contractors. That's not enough?

Does Dana Perino know who George Orwell was?

As for John Kerry, he's showing his "skull and bones" with this operation.

***

U.S. GOV'T MICROWAVE WEAPON SYSTEM CAN ALTER THE WEATHER:
IS IT BEING USED FOR GOOD OR FOR ILL IN THE GULF OIL DISASTER?

The U.S. government's covert cell-tower- based microwave laser/radio frequency directed energy weapon system -- installed on cell towers all across America -- has the capability to affect weather systems, to "alter undesirable atmospheric conditions," according to Raytheon's U.S. patent No. 7629918 and other published accounts relating to the prototype HAARP grid in Alaska.

Has this weapon system been deployed in relation to the Gulf oil disaster -- for good or ill? Read a veteran journalist's account of the uses and misuses of little known scalar electromagnetic technology:

Coburn is correct. This propaganda ministry has no place in a free and democratic society that should lead by example, not by psy ops and ham-fisted jingoism.

Dana Perino didn't even know what the Cuban Missile Crisis was. Perhaps this ministry should educate its own apparachiks first.

And why the over-arching title of "Broadcasting Board of Governors," a title that imputes no limits to its mission? The Pentagon already has these bases covered, by way of black bugets benefitting "information systems" defense contractors. That's not enough?

Does Dana Perino know who George Orwell was?

As for John Kerry, he's showing his "skull and bones" with this operation.

***

U.S. GOV'T MICROWAVE WEAPON SYSTEM CAN ALTER THE WEATHER:
IS IT BEING USED FOR GOOD OR FOR ILL IN THE GULF OIL DISASTER?

The U.S. government's covert cell-tower- based microwave laser/radio frequency directed energy weapon system -- installed on cell towers all across America -- has the capability to affect weather systems, to "alter undesirable atmospheric conditions," according to Raytheon's U.S. patent No. 7629918 and other published accounts relating to the prototype HAARP grid in Alaska.

Has this weapon system been deployed in relation to the Gulf oil disaster -- for good or ill? Read a veteran journalist's account of the uses and misuses of little known scalar electromagnetic technology: